Late Dawn
by Sitara
Summary: Who is Stellara Ammon? And what does the human Asalie Ellerton have to do with anything?


Crimson Past Series

Part 1:

Disclaimers: I did not write Nightworld. This is just an attempt to write something myself. I do own the other characters that you see here that do not belong to LJ Smith.

Summary: crimson past The Redferns weren't the only clan that could set your soul in ice. Set before the Nightworld series, this takes place somewhen in the 90's. This is what they don't want you to know. A time when the soulmate principle was just an old witches' tale, when Daybreak was not yet reborn, and when not even the Nightworld Council knew about Wildpowers and Blue fire. A time when it had only started to make sense…

late dawn Who is Stellara Ammon? And what does the human Asalie Ellerton have to do with everything?

Late Dawn

****

Prologue:

Stellara Ammon stared at the girl in the old wooden dresser mirror, wondering how on earth anyone could look so empty. What was it about her that made her seem so lost? 

Stella couldn't answer that, so instead she sighed and drew a silver blade from the bag she was carrying, placing it carefully in the pocket of her denim pants. Heaving the bag on the dresser table, she brought out several other weapons. A wooden stake, two more stakes, throwing stars, a gun… 

She shuddered as she brought out an iron knife. She watched the faint light of the small lightbulb overhead make the blade flash for a second with an odd, eerie brightness. Even then she could feel herself start to falter. 

Dropping the knife back into the bag of weapons, she decided she would let someone else carry that instead. All of the weapons she had taken out found their way to their usual place beneath the folds of her clothing, somewhere hidden yet she had easy access to. You never knew when a psycho would suddenly jump you from out of nowhere…

In the dim light of Manx Drache's small run down apartment, her slate blue eyes looked almost luminous. 

Voices were calling her from the outside. 

***

It was dark.

4th street, warehouse district. A man looked around, face pallid and panicked. His slit eyes glowing a dark cat-eye green. Skin a pale hue that drew tightly to the bone. 

__

Shhhhhsssst.

A sound barely there, clanging loudly in his ears like death. 

They were coming for him.

Without a warning, he ran, running faster…still faster through the open streets. It seemed the whole vicinity was abandoned for the night. One thing foolish to do was run to the back alleys. No, never there. It was darker, more dangerous and harder to escape. Where to go now? The only thought running past his conscious was a voice telling him to run harder, never stop.

Running.

The dark buildings loomed overhead. They towered over, taunting him. Warehouses that were full of twists and turns inside, full of dead ends and surprises. That wasn't an option either.

He stopped, with reflexes so supreme that he managed not to skid from his sudden halt. Staring through slit eyes he saw the wide stretch of asphalt road still before him, buildings blocking off any escape to the left or right. 

~Don't!~

Something in his senses told him not to continue forward. The presence of a cat shifter was coming on strong from there. NOT a good sign.

Marble skin paled just a little bit more. A shaky step back was taken before he could stop himself. So. They finally caught up.

His head jerked to the left as a sudden change reached his senses. A change with the low burning crackle of lightning and the odd smoky smell of Power. Witch magick. And this witch, he was sure, would not at all be thrilled to see him.

He looked up to the right in alarm as something landed somewhere atop the higher floors of the old brick building to his side. Something with the grace that was undoubtedly a vampire's.

Damn. They got him. He might as well have been in the back alleys, there no way but back. Two steps and… another one coming. The fourth. They got him on all sides. 

This is what the Nightworld did to your soul.

His eyes narrowed even more, as primal instinct took over. He knew that by then his eyes were now gleaming acid green in the gloom, and that his canines were lengthening into needlesharp points. A vampire himself, he wasn't going down without a rumble. 

They were coming in for the kill now, slowly. To make sure he couldn't get anything by them…to make sure they could handle this, another victim of theirs. He stood his ground, upper lip curled in a snarl.

Slayers! Nothing more than stuck up losers who couldn't take inferiority well. Tonight he would teach them a thing or two…

He growled. "Come out and show yourselves!" He shouted into the misty darkness. "I know you're here!"

Silence.

It was almost deafening. The sound of blood-newly fed- was pumping loudly in his head. A moment passed, nothing happened. A chilling smirk crept up his lips and he laughed. "I knew you were chicken." He muttered, glaring at no one in particular.

One, two, three…

Too late.

Someone slammed him on his back against the pavement, four figures swooped on him from where they were watching. The vampire had barely time to gasp before he was pinned to the ground by strong arms and strong magick… he knew what was coming next.

The last thing he ever saw were two vivid slate blue eyes, the color of the night with the stars scattered over it. A cold smile and pure red agony.

***

Asalie Ellerton opened her eyes to a new morning.

A/N: this is going to be a long fic…


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